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Avoiding Anal

I’m a woman and I like what I like when it comes to the party in my pants. And what I definitely don’t like is anal. In fact, since I lost my virginity to a certain MIC sleazeball at 15, I’ve done nothing but avoid bum-funnery at every opportunity.

Now, I know that a few of the ladies out there are total arse-penetration converts, I do. And all power to you. But the fact of the matter is that we’re now all expected to suspend disbelief and nod, wide-eyed, while every women’s magazine and beer-holding bar crawler waxes lyrical about ‘the female prostate’. And, I for one, literally smell bullshit.

I have spent many years trying out every backward-crab-esque sexual position out there, thinking it was the way to every man’s heart to be able to do upside-down-standing-69 in a rainforest shower, but things have changed. Now I can openly put my hands up and say that unless it’s a Saturday, there’s a full moon, I haven’t ingested four tons of macaroni cheese in the last half hour and I’m not on my period, I will happily be ‘crazy’ in bed (the rest of the time, missionary, spooning or lazy doggy is just fine.) Why? Because sex is sex however you do it, and I’m totally down with that in all its forms. The only game-changer is ‘rump ranging’: that thing I just won’t do.

I have a lovely man in my life that seems to really enjoy my pant party to which he is now the only man invited to. I want to make him happy all the time above and below the sheets, but surely playing Backdoor Buddies isn’t the answer (I’ve forever believed the answer was bacon, but apparently I’m wrong about that too.) He loves the bum: he’s so fascinated by it you would have thought he had been born sans derriere – but there’s no hiding the fact that every time a finger so much as wanders over into that forbidden territory, I suddenly turn into a bucking bronco, jumping six feet in the air like a scaled cat screaming out an appropriate rendition of Meatloaf’s ‘I would do anything for love’, emphasis on: ‘But I won’t do that.’

Telling a partner you don’t like anal is hard in this workaday world. You tell a man this, and they pretend that’s OK, until, y’know, it’s suddenly not OK. Because I have a sneaky suspicion that every man wants to become a backdoor-knocker, particularly if it’s unchartered territory (at least, all of those I’ve been ‘fortunate’ enough to do the horizontal tango with.) Dip your toe into modern sexuality and suddenly every man becomes Columbus – and your fudge corner, the Americas. But it’s a difficult conversation more so because unfortunately women’s sexuality is becoming more and more ‘fluid’: a vague amorphous thing, which can all too often be shaped into whichever form the man fucking her wants.

So, your boyf wants you to ‘just give it a cheeky try’. He’ll be ‘soft and gentle’, he cries, but no soft and gentle move known to humanity breaks a back door for nine days straight. Nine. That’s how long it takes for your bum to repair after it’s been dude-dived. So as much as I’m sure you’re all joining in a chorus of ‘Just Do It’, y’all sound like a Nike advert, and if Nike couldn’t get me running, you won’t get me making brownies.

In the last few years, I’ve been remarkably creative with ways to avoid posterior decorating out of sheer necessity. And in case you, like me, are a gal whose man is looking for love in all the wrong places when you’d rather just draw him a map to your vajayjay, then here are some Anal Avoidance tips I’ve found to be particularly effective. They’re tongue-in-cheek (not THAT way), but FYI, the only sex is consensual sex. If you’re not down with the brown, you’re not down with the brown; end of.

On to the tips.

Crotchless Panties - They frame your first prize so well that men forget there is even a second prize to be had.

Learn to deep-throat – Have your mouth become that cavernous hole he so craves.

Michael Bublé - No man on earth can ‘poo for two’ when that innocent face is crooning a popular ditty from the fifties in the background.

Don’t be a backseat driver- If you don’t like the route he is going, get in the driving seat; you tell him what to suck for a change.

Never doggy during the day - We all know what they’re looking at when they’re back there. If you doggy during the day, you are just showing the carrot to the ass. Or the ass to the carrot. Whatever – you’re asking for trouble.

‘You first, m’dear’ – (WARNING: This has been known to backfire. Pun only slightly intended.) Tell him you’ll do it, if he does it first. Then off to The Big Black Dildo Company you trot.

Tell him his dick is too big - Works a charm. He feels good about himself and you don’t feel like you’re shitting backwards. Everyone’s a winner.

And if all of this doesn’t work, and he’s still hankering for a drilling in the coal hole? The coup de grace:

Deny all sex - If he really wants to have sex with an asshole, he may as well have sex with himself.

38 thoughts on “Avoiding Anal”

This is the least feminist article I’ve ever read (on the Vagenda). Tell him to stop. And if he doesn’t… you’re venturing into ‘lack of consent’ territory.These ‘tips’, other than the 4th one down, just puts responsibility on the woman for HIS actions.

We probably should have made it more clear, but this part of the article – “They’re tongue-in-cheek (not THAT way), but FYI, the only sex is consensual sex. If you’re not down with the brown, you’re not down with the brown; end of” – was supposed to signal that the tips were a satire of what you might see in Cosmo. Of course we would never support being with a partner who forced you into anything sexual – and concur with Hannah that you wouldn’t want to be in a room OR a relationship with someone who did that.

I agree. This is the worst sort of undermining of a truthful response about anal sex and exactly like the thinly-veiled “put up and shut up” crap that can be found in Cosmo, et al. She may as well have said “How to keep your man happy with a pants party (what’s with all the euphemisms?)and distract him with other things rather than just say GET OUT OF THERE, I DON’T LIKE IT.” WTF, Vagenda?

Hi all – we’d just to like to clarify that this article was intended to satirise Cosmo-style tips and writing (‘party in my pants’, etc), not to be taken seriously. We stand by the disclaimer that we put before the tips – “They’re tongue-in-cheek (not THAT way), but FYI, the only sex is consensual sex. If you’re not down with the brown, you’re not down with the brown; end of” – which we hoped would show how we would never actually support being with a man who pressured you sexually. If you disliked the article, we’re certainly taking your comments into account. But just to let y’all know, we haven’t suddenly turned anti-feminist!

Thanks for clearing things up. Normally I would pick up on satire (well hopefully, anyway) but today it seems to have flown straight over my head. Whether that’s because it’s Friday and I’m shattered, or for some other reason, I’ll leave for others to decide!

I feel like I’m the only person who got that… Seriously, it’s not even like you had one disclaimer, you paraphrased the disclaimer in three different ways.

I, for one, loved this and thought it was funny, but true! I’m saving coitus for marriage, but my boyfriend and I also like to point out on my blog that we’re NOT interested in anal. For me, with Crohn’s disease, that area of my body will never be sexy to me. I’ve talked this over with some of my more sexually adventurous Crohnie friends, and they feel the same way. Having a preference doesn’t make you a prude (or a queer-shamer… duh, this is ONE person’s perspective).

I liked this article, and appreciated the sattire, and I totally agree that all sex should be consenual, and nobody should stay with a partner who is trying to coerce them into a type of sex they do not want.

Tom Bush: I’m pretty certain NG did not intend for her article to be sexist, racist or queer shaming, and I didn’t find it to be any of those things. I presume that you class a woman who states the reasons why she doesn’t want to have anal sex, as queer shaming? I find that ridiculous. If I chose not to have a male perform oral sex on me, that wouldn’t be queer shaming lesbians…

Why does everybody seem so uptight? What happenend to light-hearted satirical humour, especially that of normally Vagenda’s intelligensia readership. We all still posesss funny bones? Non?

People commenting or no means no – is the whole article about not bowing down to man wishes? #feminismrightthere

People commenting on no means no – Surely, as intelligensia of the world we can all admit knowledge to the the insight that alot of blokes like anal and don’t get it? and will try it on with their girlfriends (in a jokey way) over a passage of time? It’s the oldest jok, gag insight, truth there is in the book. #watchcomedymore

Racist/homophobic????!!!! Did I read a different article, am I buzzing? please Tom Bush copy and paste the reference for my own sanity?

The article – full of HUMOUR, observation based HUMOUR no doubt, probably slighty exagerrated for HUMOUR, like comedians do when being FUNNY.

Tom Bush, I bet the last time you got anything was a longtime time ago hence you struggling to get your head a round sexual satite and confusing it with racism.

PS Can we all lightne please? There we go. Deep breaths. and that’s it, we all remembered that we have sense of humour. Beautiful.

This article is frustratingly heteronormative. Not because of the tips at the end which are, I agree, satirical, but because it reproduces dominant gendered scripts about men being belligerent sex pests and women passive policers of men’s sexual desire. As far as I am aware (contra the claims made by the author) people are NOT having loads of anal sex all over the place. As a woman who bloody loves anal sex, I can assure you that of the 100s of people that I have slept with, I have only managed to coax anal out of a few (not that I am an authoritative quantitative study, obvs). Wanting anal sex with a woman is a fantasy, for most of the men who say that they want it. when faced with the prospect, in my opinion, many men do not go through with it. What is frustrating about this article is that it does not recognise that in fact it is difficult to have non-normative sexual desires and to talk about them. Rather than an article from someone espousing a mainstream sexual preference (no anal), far bolder would have been to have an article about how to have anal in an enjoyable and fun and safe way, if you want it.

Beyond this, Luke Stone, ‘Then off to The Big Black Dildo Company you trot’, is the racialised language that you are looking for. The joke in the rest of the point works on a homophobic premise.

Usually the stuff on the Vagenda is a bit more challenging and rewarding than this (not that I agree with it all by any means). Some people don’t like anal, so what?

Hi MinetteI agree that it is heteronormative, in that it’s a personal piece written by a heterosexual woman about being pestered by men for anal sex. But, from the looks of Twitter, this is something that happens A LOT. I will reiterate again- this is satire that is not intended to be taken seriously, and we are rather perturbed that there are people out there who seriously think we’d suggest learning to deep throat as a way of placating a partner who wants anal.

If you want to see a piece about women enjoying anal sex, why not pitch us an article? We so frequently find that people will have a go at us for not offering their viewpoint on the website when in fact, if they actually approached us with the offer of an article, we’d be perfectly happy to take it on provided it is well written. This equally goes for anyone else who would like to see more pieces that reflect their viewpoints- we can’t reflect your mindset- only you can do that! So if you have an idea for something that’s grinding your gears – get in touch! Our email is thevagenda@gmail.com

Thank god. There you are Vagenda’s intellgentsia readership. Minette.Thanks for clearing that up. You have in fact confirmed what I had resaoned was the said racist/homophobic area of the article. The only problem was that as I am black and gay I was not offended, thus struggled to understand why it was supposed to be offensive to me. But then perhaps, I have always erred towards to seeing the positive and the funny.

Bloody surprised about you struggling to get many of the hundreds you have slept with to engage in this way with you. Maybe they’re scared of being judged and confirming perceptions of them as heternormative, cliched misogynistic, gender dominant sex pests. I know my footy mates (who are all obssesed with anal) have confessed such anxieties to me before.

But point taken on the loving anal and wishing we could discuss it more, adn more openly without evoking such uptight anguish and offence.

As a woman who has had two partners who pestered her for anal (and repeatedly tried to guilt trip me into doing it despite me having explicitly stated that a) yes I had tried it b) no I didn’t like it c) no I didn’t ever want to do it again), I think this article was funny and spot on.

I’m 95% certain that the ‘You first, m’dear’ tip is something I actually have read before in Cosmo, or another monthly glossy of its ilk. It amuses me because I don’t like receiving anything up door number two, but I’m okay if I’m with a guy that does. Which I am. So saying “You first, my dear” is likely to be met with a “uh, okay.”

So…I laughed. Not sure if that makes me an awful person or not >.> it reminded me of crap magazine sex tips, though not as much as I would like as from memory the advice is often ‘go with it, you might like it, it could be different this time, he’ll appreciate the effort’ which is way worse than ‘ways to avoid’.

This piece was by a lady frustrated at being pestered for a type of sex she didn’t want… this is not what always happens apparently.

Well shit.

I thought we were all 100% the same. That’s news to me.

I am thrilled to the points of my tiny tits that some people like anal sex and others don’t, it’s part of that diversity in humanity we are all called to enjoy.

Maybe next time the writer can use her ‘united states of Tara’ multiple personality perspective technique and write an anal piece from every perspective that exists…ever.- or we could all have a chortle and those of you who are feeling marginalised by a Cosmoesque heteronormative parody can submit your equally hilarious ‘how to be awesome at pegging’ article.

LOL. Can I just clarify something on my last post? When we said ‘pitch to us’ that means just wang us a couple of sentences on what you want to write about and a little about yourself. This allows us to have a bit of a chat about the style/length of the piece BEFORE you write it. I’m saying this because we got sent a very serious 2,000 word guide to anal sex and when we rejected it because it wouldn’t have suited the blog the writer sent us probably the rudest email I have ever received, and seems to think we’re engaging in some kind of anti-anal conspiracy because we didn’t publish it.

So if you do want to write something about how much you love anal, please email us beforehand so’s we can give you some guidelines. Have a good weekend x

thanks for your response…I am of course not suggesting that just because I like anal and other people don’t that that there should exist other articles for me about it. I would be fairly self obsessed to suggest such a strategy, and I understood that this was a parody. All I am saying is that it is easy to knock something that is already a marginal practice. If you take at face value the importance of a personal piece about boyfriends who harass for anal – and I do see the importance of such a story- then that is one thing. More broadly, I am saying the social meaning of such a parody is that it reflects and reinforces already-prevalent attitudes about sexual practice. I would be curious instead to (continue to) see accounts of different ways to do heterosexuality without folding into stereotypes of what men and women want/are like, of which there are many excellent examples here. That’s all… I suppose I was speaking to a broader frustration about the difficulty of subverting the sexual status quo, but that is a story for another time…

Wow, this article is sure all about HIS pleasure. Instead of just having a mature conversation with your partner and asking him to respect your decision not to have anal sex, why do you instead resort to stroking his ego or working on tactics of distraction? This sort of writing is better off as Cosmopolitan bullshit than Vagenda writing. What an incredibly heteronormative, stereotype-fed, irritating article.

I feel like this article was slightly too negative. Firstly to men, as I have only been with two partners who suggested anal – one didn’t push the matter when I said I wasn’t sure and the other waited until I brought it up as my own suggestion after I had had a while to think about it. I also have met quite a few male friends who are not interested in anal sex and find it a turn-off. Furthermore, I think it was rather negative towards anal over-all, and slightly put down women who do enjoy anal play and anal sex.I do realise that this article was meant mostly in jest though.